This invention relates to a guard used when washing bed pans found in hospitals or other health care facilities, and deals more particularly with a bed pan washing guard having means for use after the majority of contained waste is emptied, by attaching the guard to a bed pan so that the guard supports the bed pan during a cleaning procedure and has means for hindering splashing and for passage of aerosolized effluent from the bed pan being washed.
Hitherto the conventional practice in hospitals and other health care facilities that do not utilize automated bedpan washers is to empty bed pans in which effluent, e.g. human waste, is collected and then dumped into a toilet or other drainage facility by a nurse, or other health care worker assigned the task of cleaning the bed pan and completion of the cleaning procedure through usage of a forcible water spray directed into the cavity of the bedpan to rinse remaining effluent. This procedure presents a potential problem to the health care worker inasmuch effluent residuals dislodged with the water spray can splash back onto the worker and/or transformed into an aerosol and contaminate said worker. This known practice of washing a bed pan without a protective guard of the type which the present invention is concerned, contributes to a highly unsanitary practice which could possibly lead to the spread of infections, such as staph, or even to the spread of other bacterial, infectious or even viral diseases. What is particularly problematic with this practice from the standpoint of patient care is that even though the worker covers him or herself with appropriate protective clothing, this clothing can be readily contaminated when particulates of the waste remaining in the bed pan after dumping, when sprayed by the high pressure jet nozzle of a water spray head, are splashed back onto the worker. Moreover, these particulates when subjected to a pressure spray, become aerosolized by the water stream which upon impacting on the surface of the bedpan become suspended in the air with the atomized water. These particulates if not prevented from becoming air-born, may come to rest on the clothes or skin of the health care worker, subjecting the worker to potential contamination, and/or are carried with him or her to the next patient's room where the potential for contamination and/or transmitting of disease to another exists.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a washing guard for bed pans of the aforementioned type having means for containing effluent which may otherwise be splashed onto a worker during washing, and for containing particulates of the waste contained in the pan which may become suspended in the air as a result of being impacted on by a water spray jet directed onto the bed pan inner surface during a cleaning process by the user.
Still a further object of the invention is to provide a low-cost reuseable washing guard of the aforementioned type which is capable of withstanding sterilization processes common to the medical industry and is readily connectable to a bed pan for covering it during a cleaning procedure and thereby hindering aspirated effluent from being released directly onto the involved worker.
Further objects and advantages of the invention will become apparent from the below disclosure and the appended claims.